I was born in Poonch (Kashmir) and now I live in Norway. I oppose war and violence and am a firm believer in the peaceful co-existence of all nations and peoples. In my academic work I have tried to espouse the cause of the weak and the oppressed in a world dominated by power politics, misleading propaganda and violations of basic human rights. I also believe that all conscious members of society have a moral duty to stand for and further the cause of peace and human rights throughout the world.

Saturday, August 29, 2015

“You are free; you are free to go to
your temples. You are free to go to your mosques or to any other places
of worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion,
caste or creed—that has nothing to do with the business of the State.”

— Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the Founder of Pakistan (1876-1948).
————

No doubt, the ideas of Mr Jinnah in the above citation are admirable
and meet the needs of the present times. But what happened in practice
in Pakistan after his death, to his idea of a democratic state and to
Pakistani citizens’ freedom to follow any faith or creed without state
coercion and interference?

The Pakistan State was transformed into a
sole monopolist of Islam; and Islam was made an instrument to exploit
the people of Pakistan. Consequently, the magical mixture of State and
Religion (Sunni branch only!) was baptised as ‘the Islamic Republic of
Pakistan’.

No great Caliph has appeared on the political horizon yet,
even though the late dictator general Zia-ul-Haq left no doubt where he
stood!

However, under the infamous blasphemy laws the minorities suffer.
In fact, anyone can falsely accuse a member of any religious minority,
mostly to settle personal vendetta or conflicts, as has happened on many
occasions, and thus start the vicious litigation against innocent
people that can result in incredible punishments.

Thursday, August 27, 2015

Nasir Khan, August 27, 2015“Is it more probable that nature should go out of her course or that a
man should tell a lie? We have never seen, in our time, nature go out
of her course. But we have good reason to believe that millions of lies
have been told in the same time. It is therefore at least millions to
one that the reporter of a miracle tells a lie. ”― Thomas Paine (1737-1809)———————-The human mind has great capacity to create fantasies and incredible tales. But I have no time to speculate about the nature of miracles that are told in our old books and by our story-tellers.

However, I have witnessed some miracles in my life and without these I
would have died four years ago or in case of my continued survival
would have lost my eyesight. They were the miracles of medical science
and its advanced surgery that saved my life, extended the duration of my
life and saved my eyesight. No doubt, the same thing happens in the
lives of many other people.That means miracles still take place but we have to see where they
happen! Not an easy thing to do by any means because the dead weight of
accumulated traditional baggage stands in our way. But we have some
clear options.~Nasir Khan————-'For a short life-sketch of Thomas Paine, see : http://www.ushistory.org/paine/

Nasir Khan, August 27, 2015
–
“When we blindly adopt a religion, a political system, a literary dogma, we become automatons.”
― Anaïs Nin (1903-1977)
——————
One point about religion in Nin’s quotation above:

First, in the past ages there have been mass conversions from one religion to the other. But not any longer in this age.

In fact, most of us are born into a
religious community; we inherit religions from our parents and our
societies. As a result, the followers of a religion regard their
religion true and the embodiment of all virtues that human beings need.
They don’t say they are following their religion ‘blindly’. Never. They
think they are rational human beings and what they believe in is true
and the only right way.
Some may ‘tolerate’ the followers of other faiths; but that extends only to tolerating them, nothing more than that!

Secondly, in these times only a limited number of people change their religion for a new one. No mass conversions take place.

Thirdly, religious people do not
accept any argument that goes against their religion and its dogmas. No
rational exchange of views is possible with such people. They will
justify what they believe in by appealing to some ‘Authority’ they can
never question. Full stop.

~Nasir Khan, 26.08.2015

—————————–

Dr Rick Staggenborg, admin of
SOLDIERS FOR PEACE INTERNATIONAL wrote in response to my post. I am
posting his comment followed by my reply. We both have somewhat
different approaches towards the believers of religions that are evident
in our exchanged comments.
–
• Rick Staggenborg: Sorry, Nasir but you lost me the minute you stopped
talking about “most people” and began to make claims about all followers
of religion. Like almost all statements about universal attributes of
groups of humans, the assertions fail to hold up to objective scrutiny.
Nin’s statement is true because it specifically refers to “those who
BLINDLY adopt” a belief system of any type.

It is true that most of us adopt the religious beliefs of our family
and/or community, but that means many different things to many different
people. A Sufi can be very dedicated to Islam without accepting dogma
that some Muslims consider defining, but only takfiris would deny that
they are co-religionists.

We all construct a personal world view that is based on our
experience and concepts we learn as children. It is only by challenging
these assumptions and thinking for ourselves that we continue to grow
and to develop a personal reality that is internally consistent and
conforms to what is measurable (though is not necessarily limited to
that).

The fact of the matter is that almost everyone reaches a point where
they stop questioning their assumptions and accept anything they are
told that corresponds to their prejudices. As a result, as such people
get older they get more and more divorced from what is as close to
objective reality as humans can approach.

We have to take that into account when trying to persuade others. I
encourage all Soldiers For Peace to never forget that our purpose is to
unite, not to divide. To attribute undesirable qualities to every member
of a group of people is not just fallacious, but harmful to our cause.

http://www.soldiersforpeaceinternational.org/…/changing…
•
Nasir Khan: Dear Rick, your reply makes sense and I do appreciate your
concerns for uniting people, not dividing them as you say in your last
paragraph. However, I also find your views on religion very personal and
subjective. Whereas what I said was to point to the difficulty of
exchange of views with the followers of religions. I see no need to
change my views on the matter.

We know fully well that Religion is a complex phenomenon; no attempt
to summarise it in a few lines can be adequate. Therefore, I am not
going to attempt to do that either. However, some people do not follow
the familiar mould of beliefs and dogmas they had learnt in their
younger age. To come out of that mould of thinking is difficult. Various
social pressures all around us push us to conformity. That’s what
happens with most of us. Indoctrination that had made inroads into our
consciousness in childhood we cannot shake off. Apparently, the
possibility to question one’s assumptions is there; but most often
people will defend their assumptions on which their inherited beliefs
are based than to question them!

You are right to point out how a Sufi can remain dedicated to Islam
without accepting dogma. But this raises another question: Is there an
Islam without dogma? If we can leave all dogmas aside than we have a
pure form of universal humanism. I can’t see your propositions can stand
the test of a close scrutiny in this matter. However, I respect your
broadminded approach to such issues. By the way, in all world religions
there are also mystics as there are the Sufis in Islam. Orthodoxy has
fought against and suppressed such ideas wherever possible. In many
Islamic countries, the orthodoxy has taken over; liberal thought in
matters of religion has been scuttled in the public life. That dangerous
trend is spreading everywhere.

As I see it, our respective views on religion separate us. As long as
I am around, I will continue to voice my concerns about the antihuman
practices and ideas of indoctrinated people and the dangers they pose to
us all. So, I think the best option for me is to thank you for allowing
me to use Soldiers For Peace. In future, I will not post any articles
or comments.

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

Under Prophet Mohammad’s second successor, Caliph Omar (reigned:
634-644 AD), the great era of Arab expansion began. I reproduce below
his letter to the King of Persia, followed by the king’s response. As
compared to the civilised Persians, the Arabs were culturally low. But
the Arabs were able to defeat the Persians and incorporate their vast
country into their expanding empire.

What is interesting in the letters
are the perceptions of the two rulers about their own religions and
their countries. The Persians followed the Zoroastrian faith, based on
belief in One God, unlike the pre-Islamic Arabs who had hundreds of gods
and goddesses. The Muslim caliph misunderstood Persians as polytheists
or fire worshippers. Fire for Zoroastrian had a symbolic meaning in the
same way as the Black Stone in the Meccan shrine had a symbolic meaning
for the Arabs even after the coming of Islam.
————-Text of the ultimatum from Omar Ibn-Khat’tab, the Caliph of Islam, to the Persian King, Yazdgerd III:

In the name of Allah, the Benificent, the Merciful

To the Shah of the Fars

I do not foresee a good future for you and your nation save your
acceptance of my terms and your submission to me. There was a time when
your country ruled half the world, but see how now your sun has set. On
all fronts your armies have been defeated and your nation is condemned
to extinction. I point out to you the path whereby you might escape this
fate. Namely, that you begin worshipping the one god, the unique deity,
the only god who created all that is. I bring you his message. Order
your nation to cease the false worship of fire and to join us, that they
may join the truth.

Worship Allah the creator of the world. Worship Allah and accept
Islam as the path of salvation. End now your polytheistic ways and
become Muslims that you may accept Allah-u-Akbar as your savior. This is
the only way of securing your own survival and the peace of your
Persians. You will do this if you know what is good for you and for your
Persians. Submission is your only option. Allah u Akbar.

The Caliph of Muslims
Omar ibn-Khat’tab
—————–Response of the Persian King:

In the name of Ahuramazda, the Creator of Life and Wisdom

From the Shahan-Shah of Iran, Yazdgerd, to Omar ibn Khat’tab, the Arab Caliph.In your letter you summon us Iranians to your god whom you call
“Allah-u-Akbar” [Allah]; and because of your barbarity and ignorance,
without knowing who we are and Whom we worship, you demand that we seek
out your god and become worshippers of “Allah-u-Akbar [Allah]”.

How strange that you occupy the seat of the Arab Caliph but are as
ignorant as any desert roaming Arab! You admonish me to become
monotheistic [believer in one god] in faith. Ignorant man, for thousands
of years we Aryaee have, in this land of culture and art, been
monotheistic and five times a day have we offered prayers to God’s
Throne of Oneness. While we laid the foundations of philanthropy and
righteousness and kindness in this world and held high the ensign of
“Good Thoughts, Good Words and Good Deeds”, you and your ancestors were
desert wanderers who ate snakes and lizards and buried your innocent
daughters alive.

You Arabs who have no regard for God’s creatures, who mercilessly put
people to the sword, who mistreat your women and bury you daughters
alive, who attack caravans and are highway robbers, who commit murder,
who kidnap women and spouses; how dare you presume to teach us, who are
above these evils, to worship God?

You tell me to cease the worship of fire and to worship God instead!
To us Iranians the light of Fire is reminiscent of the Light of God. The
radiance and the sun-like warmth of fire exuberates our hearts, and the
pleasant warmth of it brings our hearts and spirits closer together,
that we may be philanthropic, kind and considerate, that gentleness and
forgiveness may become our way of life, and that thereby the Light of
God may keep shining in our hearts.

Our God is the Great Ahuramazda. Strange is this that you too have
now decided to give Him a name, and you call Him by the name of
“Allah-u-Akbar [Allah]”.

But we are nothing like you. We, in the name of Ahuramazda, practice
compassion and love and goodness and righteousness and forgiveness, and
care for the dispossessed and the unfortunate; But you, in the name of
your “Allah-u-Akbar [Allah]” commit murder, create misery and subject
others to suffering! Tell me truly who is to blame for your misdeeds?
Your god who orders genocide, plunder and destruction, or you who do
these things in his name? Or both?

You, who have spent all your days in brutality and barbarity, have
now come out of your desolate deserts resolved to teach, by the blade
and by conquest, the worship of God to a people who have for thousands
of years been civilized and have relied on culture and knowledge and art
as mighty supports.

What have you, in the name of your “Allah-u-Akbar” [Allah], taught
these armies of Islam besides destruction and pillage and murder that
you now presume to summon others to your god?

Today, my people’s fortunes have changed. Their armies, who were
subjects of Ahuramazada, have now been defeated by the Arab armies of
“Allah-u-Akbar [Allah]”. And they are being forced, at the point of the
sword, to convert to the god by the name of “Allah-u-Akbar [Allah]”. And
are forced to offer him prayers five times a day but now in Arabic;
since your “Allah-u-Akbar [Allah]” only understands Arabic.

I advise you to return to your lizard infested deserts. Do not let
loose upon our cities your cruel barbarous Arabs who are like rabid
animals. Refrain from the murder of my people. Refrain from pillaging my
people. Refrain from kidnapping our daughters in the name of your
“Allah-u-Akbar [Allah]”. Refrain from these crimes and evils.

We Aryaee are a forgiving people, a kind and well-meaning people.
Wherever we go, we sow the seeds of goodness, amity and righteousness.
And this is why we have the capacity to overlook the crimes and the
misdeeds of your Arabs.

Stay in your desert with your “Allah-u-Akbar [Allah]”, and do not
approach our cities; for horrid is your belief and brutish is your
conduct.

Wednesday, August 12, 2015

“The purpose of education is not to validate ignorance but to overcome it”

― Lawrence M. Krauss (born: 1954)
————-

Ignorance overpowers us in many ways. Sometimes, some of us know it
assailing us, but most of the time most of us do not know that we are in
the grips of it. It has great power over the minds and hearts of the
people.

One major form of ignorance is institutionalised ignorance,
which the traditionalists perpetuate in the name of education and their
hackneyed formulas. They practically
lock out all critical thinking by constant brainwashing of the ordinary
people, both young and old. If, you are in doubt, look at the old
traditional societies and draw your own conclusions!

Any anti-human
offence, ranging from the mutilation of female children’s genitals,
marrying female children to adult males, subjecting one’s own body to
unnecessary pain, to the practice of 'honour killings', etc., etc., can be justified by the harbingers of
human misery and depravity because they can point to old traditions and
social practices.

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has
instructed the U.S. Congress to reject an international agreement
constraining Iran’s nuclear program and to humiliate the sitting U.S.
president, thus testing where the primary allegiance of most members of
Congress lies, with the U.S. or Israel, writes John V. Whitbeck.

By John V. Whitbeck

The choice facing members of the U.S. Congress in September’s
“disapproval” votes could scarcely be clearer and has little to do with
the merits of the international agreement reached on July 14 with
respect to Iran’s nuclear program.

Whether one believes that there was a genuine risk of Iran attacking
Israel with a nuclear weapon or, more sensibly, that there was a genuine
risk of Israel attacking Iran with conventional or nuclear weapons (the
real and only rational reason for the mobilization of the European
Union, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany
on this issue), the “Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action” reached in
Vienna should vastly reduce the risk of a catastrophic war involving
Iran and Israel.

Saturday, August 08, 2015

“God speaks through me. Without that, I couldn’t do my job.” — George W. Bush, quoted in Lancaster New Era, July 16, 2004

Such was the claim of the former US President. He said this after the
US armed forces had invaded and occupied two large countries,
Afghanistan and Iraq. At that time, he was the most powerful leader of
the mighty militarist superpower as well as a ‘divinely’ elevated person
because God communicated with him. To my knowledge, in modern history
we do not find another instance when a mortal man and the immortal God
joined forces for U.S. to unleash two destructive wars! However, the
implications of his pronouncements had a direct bearing on his political
stature and his policies. Even though, he made his policies and issued
his executive orders with the help of his close neoconservative advisers
and secretaries but in doing so he was doing God’s work. God was
speaking through him; therefore, God mandated whatever he did. God had
chosen the right man to do His work!

If we accept the claims of divine guidance, for the sake of argument,
that he, in fact, made on many times, then we can point to the results
he achieved by his genocidal wars. Under his leadership, the US armed
forces invaded and occupied Afghanistan and Iraq in the most brutal way.
They killed hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis and Afghans who
had no quarrel with the people of the United States or posed any threat
to the global U.S. hegemony and power. The destruction of Iraq was
systematic. The Bush administration undertook the destruction of Iraqi
state and its infrastructure as a necessary step to imposing the
imperial diktat in the Middle East. It uprooted the social and
administrative structure of Iraq and replaced it with sectarian puppet
regimes that followed the orders of Washington and the Pentagon.

To make the imperial take-over easy and to neutralise any resistance
to the new geopolitical order in this vast and oil-rich country,
imperial masters used sectarian discord of the population as a
convenient tool. How did it matter to Bush if Sunni and Shia turned
against each other and started terrorist violence against their own
people – the people of Iraq? Religious fanatics and miscreants were free
to weaken Iraq while the occupiers could have an easy task to control
the country and its resources. Thus, the US occupation could continue
with greater ease while the country was drenched in bloodshed and mayhem
that is still going on.

Through his destructive policies in the occupied Iraq, the Bush
administration destabilised the whole region and played with the lives
of millions of Iraqis by reducing them to destitution, poverty,
homelessness and helplessness. The rampant killings in Iraq have claimed
the lives of uncountable victims. In the first 7 years of US
occupation, about 1.3 million Iraqi died. The main source of this
incredible catastrophe that engulfed Iraq in 2003 was the US invasion.
The ultimate responsibility of the present cycle of violence and
bloodshed remains with Mr Bush.

Mr Bush’s military invasion and occupation of Afghanistan resulted in
large-scale deaths of Afghans. The brutal treatment of the prisoners of
war and the innocent victims in the process of occupying Afghanistan is
a dark chapter in the history of twenty-first century. The occupying
power violated the Geneva Conventions regarding the treatment of
prisoners of war, international humanitarian conventions and all norms
of international law. All this happened because God said to Bush to do
so! In fact, this is a preposterous assertion that even Al Capone would
not have resorted to! Let us take a common sense view of his claim and
its consequences. What that means is that the former president is not
responsible for the wars and war crimes but someone else is! In legal
terms, he is implying that God is vicariously responsible for his wars
and war crimes. In this way, he absolves himself of any responsibility
for his actions and his policies as the head of US Government! A very
convenient but cheap method to deceive the world, no doubt!

There is no need for us to enter into any lengthy theological
discourse on God and his attributes. It is common knowledge that most
believers see God as a kind, merciful and loving power. For having such
attributes, believers hold Him in high respect and praise Him. It is
hard to think that the Heavenly Father, as Christians call God, could
have asked or encouraged Mr Bush to start major wars of aggression and
commit the most heinous crimes against other weaker nations in this
century. In brief, to impute such designs to God or because of
fulfilling a mission from God is a reprehensible act on the part of Mr
Bush. In the eyes of any sincere believers, he is maligning God in a
vicious way if he believes in Him as he seemingly professes to do.

Alternatively, what if he really believed in what he asserted about
God? That is something, which we can look at cursorily from a legal
point of view. In criminal law, the actions of the alleged offenders are
primarily judged for the mens rea – that is, their state of mind and
intentions when they committed some indictable offence. In some cases,
they are entitled to the defence of diminished responsibility or
diminished capacity if their mental condition was impaired in such a way
that they did not fully understand what they did. If such a defence is
successful, the accused are given mitigated sentences or sent for
medical treatment, depending on the gravity of offences involved. In an
old case of acute insanity, one person beheaded a sleeping man just to
see what he would do when woke up in the morning but didn’t find his
head!

There are many cases when people hear sounds or messages from some
unknown sources exhorting them to do something that may amount to a
criminal offence. A hallucination is a perception that is not based on
objective reality. It is very much a subjective condition of mind and in
this condition, people may see or visualise things that having nothing
to do with reality. In this age, we come across cases when some people
say they have heard God or God has given them some message. If Mr Bush
is sincere in his claims about God speaking to him, then that is
something for which only the professional psychologists can offer their
expert views.

In case a judicial miracle (which I don’t see taking place!) takes place and the world sees the former US president, G.W. Bush, being
prosecuted for his wars and the alleged war crimes in a court of law
then the question of hallucinations would certainly be an issue in any
legal process. However, facts point to a different direction: That he
acted with deliberation and premeditation in pursuing his policies and
his destructive wars.

Wednesday, August 05, 2015

Among my friends are both believers and non-religious people. My
believing friends include Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs,
Buddhists and Bahais, etc., who follow different traditional theologies
of their respective religions. Through my interaction with vast number
of people, I have come to realise that they can be a great force for the
common good if they acknowledge the rights of others to follow their
religions and religious traditions as long as these do not constitute a
threat to society or violate acceptable social norms.

As a small step to peaceful relations between people and advance the
cause of social understanding , I ask all my Facebook friends, who are
believers, to be generous to each other and to all others, and say that
all of them are right to believe in their versions of god! If there is
only one god, called by different names in different religions and
cultures, as many believers believe, then all old and new controversies
and disagreements about Him become baseless. An apple remains an apple
even though different languages have a different word for it.

Consequently, we can safely assume that the believers of one religion
have no real problem with the believers of other religions. Their
historical feuds and conflicts have been caused more by
misunderstandings and misperceptions than anything else. In other words,
there is no real problem among the believers. They are all members of
one big human family, worshipping and praising the same god.

The message of tolerance and concern for the interests of all,
irrespective of their religions and creeds, is old; many sages and
thinking people have proclaimed it in all ages and epochs. One great
example of such a noble thought is found in the edicts of the Indian
Emperor Asoka the Great (r. 273-232 B.C.). His Twelfth Edict says:

“His Sacred Majesty honors both ascetics and the householders of all
religions, and he honors them with gifts and honors of various kinds.
But [he] does not value gifts as much as he values this – that there
should be growth in the essentials of all religions. Growth in
essentials can be done in different ways, but all of them have as their
root restraint in speech, that is, not praising one’s own religion, or
condemning the religion of others without good cause. And if there is
cause for criticism, it should be done in a mild way. But it is better
to honor other religions for this reason. By so doing, one’s own
religion benefits, and so do other religions, while doing otherwise
harms one’s own religion and the religions of others. Whoever praises
his own religion, due to excessive devotion, and condemns others with
the thought ‘Let me glorify my own religion,’ only harms his own
religion. Therefore contact (between religions) is good. One should
listen to and respect the doctrines professed by others. The Sacred
Majesty desires that all should be well-learned in the good doctrines of
other religions.”

In this edict there is much food for thought for believers of all religions.

Monday, August 03, 2015

In urban planning, slums are thought of as a tumor; an alien growth
that can risk the overall development of an urban mega project. The
notion ignores the fact that the labor force needed to materialize the
urban dream often comes from this underbelly, which provides shelter to
lives lived in the shadow of ostentation. Militancy, terrorism, natural
calamity, and operation against militants, are driving mass migration to
the cities of Pakistan at an unprecedented rate.

According to UN Habitat report, in 2000, nearly 50 percent of
Pakistan’s most populated city, Karachi, lived in slums. Around 40
million of Pakistan’s urban population lives in katchi abadis, where
they are deprived basic facilities like water, sewerage and electricity.Islamabad, the capital, has witnessed mass migration from other
provinces, particularly from Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa (KPK), following
operation Zarb-e-Azab that intends to root out militants. Those evicted
so have turned to urban centers for job opportunities and better
educational facilities for their children.